Summary

Ducane and Paula anxiously discuss what they should do. Barbara tells them that Pierce went in over fifteen minutes ago. Ducane tells Paula to sound the alarm, ringing the coast guard and the village, and to try to find a motorboat. Ducane is going to swim to the entrance of the cave and hopes to meet Pierce there. Paula and the children run off and Ducane runs into the sea, swimming toward the cave.

He enters the cave, only fifteen minutes before the mouth of the cave would close off. He doesn't really have a plan and now that he is in the cave, reality seems to recede. He calls for Pierce, allowing the water to carry him farther into the cave. Seeing something that looks like a hole, Ducane swims toward it, entering the blackness. He calls out again and hears a faint cry in reply. He...